So I saw Tiger Zinda Hain last night. And I was crammed again with the filmy keeda that lay dormant hitherto from years maybe. Not that I loved the movie. The movie was just about okayish. Or perhaps I’ve given up on the Khans. But then, I was in a theatre after ages and that was enough to make me lose my marbles. The ‘over the top’ drama sparked off the drama streaks in me and here’s what I dreamt of early this morning.
I’m some ten years younger (yes, it’s a dream, what did you expect) and a famous blog writer and twitter person. So famous that a handful of us are handpicked by the Big B to visit his house for a day’s stay as his guests and get to know and write about his life, living and family. And somehow I bag this opportunity and somehow my parents allow me to go. (That’s a bigger miracle than meeting Big B because my father like Amrish Puri never said - Ja Suruchi Ja. Jee le apne zindagi. He never allowed me to go even on a ‘chotu sa bagal ke gaon mein’ school trip, and that too from the all girls convent school that I belonged to, not bothering about the scars this would leave on my ymind for a lifetime to come).
Anyway, one of his agencies selects us and we land there all charged up, knowing not what to expect. After the initial introductions, soon everyone gets busy exploring some nook and corner or some celebrity inhabitant of that huge ass mansion while I’m sitting there randomly observing a painted wall. It’s then that I’m graced with the presence of His Highness himself who asks why am I not buzzing around like the others. And that voice. That close to me. To be heard in person. For all my witty cells, I may have just turned into a Dodo. Only from within though. We hold our turf proudly.
The ice is broken and we get talking into larger and deeper things. (Now I suck at social gatherings and would rather choose a corner to disappear in, defamed for being conspicuous by my absence, but whenever I’ve managed to have someone ‘one to one’ for a while, they’ve held on to me for dear life. If only we could put that as special skills on the resume.)
So one thing leads to another and we have a heart to heart as Amit (I’ve already begun to “fondly” call him that) bares himself to me and talks about things he’s never revealed before. It’s almost like a circle of trust he finds himself in, with me and he must release himself now or it wouldn’t be ever. I listen like a three year old child, holding on to his hand and looking in his eyes. A tear trickles down mine perhaps. And the noise in the backdrop and constant activity, relegated to just that - the backdrop. We couldn’t have been more alone and surrounded by silence like we did then. In our heads.
What began as a buoyant banter turns into a whisper of the spoken musings of a heavy heart and I give a long tight hug to cheer him up. He makes me sit down and rests his head on my shoulder with eyes shut even as he mutters - however peaceful this feels, I fear what comes next.
And I scrunch my forehead thinking he’s wondering about his financial liabilities or performance pressures that he’d have to face in the day. Just then I hear Jaya’s loud exclaim from the backdrop coming alive. (Now Jaya is not what I’ve begun to fondly call her too, it’s just that I can’t call the husband Amit and go all “Jaya ji” on the wife, can I?)
So all hell breaks lose. Immediately the guards are all alert and I’m dragged away as though I had drugged and assassinated the country’s biggest superstar. Abhishek, Aishwarya and a host of other family members arrive at the scene of crime in their posh garbs and jaw dropped expressions. I felt like how Nathuram Godse would have felt and I almost awaited the shots to pierce my heart, that a few minutes ago was warmed with unexpected mush by a man who made me weak in the knees, like no man had ever before or ever will.
The family takes him away even as he turns around to catch a last glimpse of me. Wait! He’s not the underage heroine of a film and you guys are not the zaalim zamindaars. Stop behaving like that. I was now doning the angry young man avtaar. He’d rubbed off on me too. I shouted and tried to explain that we were just talking and they should stop creating a scene when someone threw my bags and unpacked stuff at me and asked me to get out.
The other girls’ things were thrown on the lush grass of the garden too as Jaya muttered “I told him it was a bad idea but mere sunta he kaun hain iss ghar mein” and stomped off, as irony turned around in her grave and died again.
I rose like a brave injured tiger (yes, Tiger Zinda Hain) and rushed towards the entrance of the house. I knew I now had to be my own Knight in shining armor. Just then someone made a thud on my head with the butt of a rifle. Wait, that was also the thud on the door because Seeya had awoken and was knocking to let her in so she could slink in my blanket.
I woke up with “kahan hoon mein?” expression and thankfully not screaming “Amit, Amit, mein aa rahe hoon or Amit, Amit, I’m coming” for my knight in sleeping armor next to me in bed would not believe my reasons, even if I explained.
So yeah. There it is. Another one of my dreams crushed by reality and fate’s cruel hands. But we dream on. And some day, the shiddat would make the entire kaaynaat conspire to make my dreams come true. Amen!